


I Will Put my Faith and Trust in You

by Dialects_and_Costumes



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, And Modern Brienne's gonna help move some things along, But also not, Canon Brienne, Canon Brienne and Modern Brienne are gonna share Canon Brienne's mind, Canon Compliant Injuries, Canon Jaime, F/M, Frottage, Like Jaime waking up to how much of a snack Brienne is, Modern Brienne, Porn With Plot, and so he doesn't make dumb decisions later on, consistent consent is sexy, in as much that Jaime makes different decisions MUCH earlier, mind sharing, there's a slight soupcon of hurt/comfort as well?, this ended up having a hint of s8 fix it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-12
Updated: 2020-08-20
Packaged: 2021-03-05 21:41:33
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 11,987
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25852291
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dialects_and_Costumes/pseuds/Dialects_and_Costumes
Summary: "“She is going to write about you saving all of King’s Landing and of knighting her and fighting against the Dead Army, and she is going toforgiveyou. Why does she do that? If I’m going to spend the rest of this nightmare as this Brienne, can you tell me why you make her feel like she’s soaring and drowning all at the same time, and why it's making my chest ache?”Brienne shuddered slightly as the pain in her shoulder refused to disappear. This dream had gone on far too long, and her dreams never hurt like this.This is no dream. You and I both know this.“And what if this is no nightmare? What if by some bizarre turn of fate, I’ve been sucked into the mind of a woman as far removed from my time as you are to the arrival of the first Men to this continent? What if I have altered all of history just byyellingat you? What if I’ve removed the first lady knight from existence? What if-“Jaime interrupted Brienne’s growing panic and the other Brienne's thoughts with an impulsive kiss.
Relationships: Jaime Lannister/Brienne of Tarth
Comments: 69
Kudos: 145
Collections: Jaime x Brienne Fic Exchange 2020





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [catherineflowers](https://archiveofourown.org/users/catherineflowers/gifts).



> Catherineflowers was kind enough to request I "get them into bed before they leave Harrenhal" and also mentioned a love of AUs, so I had fun smushing them together to have a little bit of mind-sharing smut with a soupçon of plot thrown in the mix.
> 
> Full disclosure, this might veer into some consent issues because this is very much a Modern Brienne in Past Brienne's body sharing her mind, and I want to honor that to some folks, that brings forward some questions regarding consent. Within the context of the scene and the story, I try my best to ensure all parties are consenting as much as they possibly can.
> 
> Title is taken from "Enchantment Passing Through (reprise)" by Elton John, for the musical _Aida_

_Drip._

_Drip._

_Drip._

Brienne had remained standing in the dimming firelight, rooted to the spot Ser Jaime had made his departing vow, watching the flames fade into nothingness, the popping and crackling being replaced by the quiet trickle of rain seeping into the room from the broken window above her head.

_“I will return the Stark girls to their mother. I swear it.”_

Brienne glanced down at the coals struggling to stay golden red with heat as her memory slid over the promise Jaime had made her before leaving her. She didn’t blame him; he had attempted to play politics with Lord Bolton and had won freedom for one of them, Jaime was not to be held accountable for her own lack of influence in this world of wars and men.

She had said goodbye to him, and he had promised to save the Stark girls. That would be enough. It had to be enough.

_Someone else must find justice for Renly, but I know he’ll keep Lady Catelyn’s daughters safe. He will keep his oath to me._

Brienne closed her eyes, clinging to Jaime’s final words to her.

_“I swear it.”_

It would only be a matter of time before Locke, left to his own sadistic pursuits, would realize he would receive no sapphires from Tarth. Her goodbye to Jaime had rung with its unspoken finality, and it was his promise that kept her from sinking deep into despair as she waited for Locke’s inevitable arrival. She had set her bones into stone to keep the pain of their final farewell from welling up and causing her to sob. _Don’t let these shits see you cry._

The Brienne of a week ago, the Brienne of a day ago would have threatened to duel with this Brienne now, this Brienne who wanted to weep at being parted from the Kingslayer, who saw him as something precious, a thing to treasure.

_Jaime._

_His name is Jaime._

Brienne took a shuddering breath, unable to settle her thoughts, almost all of them focusing in on the mercurial man she had dragged halfway across Westeros. She ground her jaw in order to steady her composure. It was only betrayed by the obsessive way her fingers twisted around the fabric of the ridiculous dress Lord Bolton’s lackeys had tossed at her in the bathing house.

Commotion in the corridor signaled to Brienne her wait was soon to be over. She had faintly heard the horns of Lord Bolton departing for the Twins less than an hour ago, and she had no doubts Locke had not forgotten his prize in the cellars of Harrenhal.

The chamber door swung open, and Locke pushed his way in, flanked by two heavily armored bannermen with matching dull and cold expressions.

“Three hundred gold dragons, _my lady_.” Brienne did not realize Locke had the ability to address her as a lady with the same venom he had called her bitch earlier, but it seemed she was destined to be badly surprised at the level of vitriol in this vile man.

“I have no such sum to offer you,” she replied coldly.

“Your father has _offered_ me an insult for your safe return. I wanted sapphires and he taunts me with a paltry sum of gold in return.”

Brienne closed her eyes, refusing to wince. Jaime’s lie had saved her life only for it to be forfeit once more to the weasel glowering at her now.

_Without that lie… would Jaime have ever told anyone about Aerys?_

_Would he remember me?_

Brienne opened her eyes again, and merely glared in reply to Locke. She would give this man no satisfaction in hearing her voice crack in fear or even disgust. He sneered at her before scoffing to the two men flanking him.

“It’s no matter. I’ll have my fun with you regardless of what your highborn daddy offers for you. Grab her.”

Locke vanished down the hallway as the two guards advanced on her. Brienne’s head whipped around to try and find _something, anything_ to defend herself with, but before she could even register half the room, one set of hands was forcing her arms together, and the other was roping her hands together tightly. Brienne could feel panic threatening to set in as the rope cut into her skin, and her breath shuddered down her spine.

 _No. You must attempt to survive, dammit. You are no wilting flower, you are Brienne of Tarth, the first woman to be named to a Kingsguard, and you_ can _survive this. Shove the fear away, shove it away and focus._

“How long do you think she’ll last against the bear?”

So much for focus.

_A bear. They’re going to make me fight a bear. Sweet Mother, what am I going to do?_

“Last time I saw them toss someone into the pit, the fucker sat in the corner and cried until the bear charged at him. This one’s got a lot more spirit.” It would have almost been better if the men looked the part of villains, but up close, they had almost bland, normal faces. A little grizzled and a little gray from having to fight in the second war to cross the lands of the Seven Kingdoms in their lifetime, but distressingly normal.

_Is that worse? Is it worse they look normal? They could be from Tarth._

Brienne would have almost been grateful to the two men shoving her up the stone steps and out of Harrenhal’s keep, for it kept them from discovering her shaking hands and legs as despair flooded into her body. She stumbled on the top step, and the two guardsmen leered as she struggled back to her feet.

 _Focus. Shove the fear away._ She straightened to her full height, and shot the two men a venomous glower.

“Definitely more spirit in this one. Two gold dragons she lives until nightfall, and I’ll throw in a flagon of ale if we see her land a single blow.”

There was only a certain amount of terror that could live in her body at once, Brienne noted faintly as the men grabbed her arms once more to lead her to the pit where she was going to die. She was almost resentful at having to discover it so early in her adulthood.

_No! Dammit, get your head on straight, are you a fighter or aren’t you?_

By the time she had been dragged up the wooden scaffolding to the top of the bear pit, Locke had been able to truly stoke the bloodthirsty hunger of the remaining Bolton and Stark bannermen, and he greeted her captors with a gesture to bring her down to her knees. She grunted as the two men kicked at the back of her legs, forcing her to the edge of the wooden planks looking down into the pit. Brienne refused to look down, refused to let a single twitch of her face reveal her terror at the sight of the bear pacing back and forth below her.

Locke grabbed her head, yanking it back as he hollered at the men surrounding the pit, “This bitch’s craven father, her dear old daddy, he thinks he can mock me? If I have the Maid of the Sapphire Isles in my control, I _bloody well better get my sapphires!_ ” Brienne gritted her teeth, refusing to flinch at the roar from the crowd. She would not allow these _men_ to see her buckle. She was no coward.

“So I say we let the bear tear her up into little pieces to send back to Lord Tarth, what do you say to _THAT_?” Another roar of wordless approval from the mob gathering around the wretched man shouting next to her, and Brienne’s hands were white with tension in her bonds. Locke’s nails dug into her scalp, making her hiss with pain as he leaned in.

“There’s no spoiled lordling around to save yourself this time. Say hello to my bear, _my lady_.”

Brienne spat in his face.

Locke cursed as he straightened, bellowing to the horde, “I’ve had enough of this bitch, _THROW HER TO THE BEAR._ ”

Brienne had a moment’s warning, the feel of a man’s boot on her back and the sound of her bonds being cut, before she was toppling into the pit, landing on her front, mud and bear shit splattering into her face. The impact knocked the wind from her lungs and she gasped for air, trying not to gag as the muck on her face dripped into her gaping mouth.

Scrambling to her feet, Brienne’s feet tripped over the wooden sword Locke had tossed into the pit after her, and she swore under her breath as she grabbed it. 

_Focus. Don’t be afraid, put the fear away and fight._

If it weren’t for the lathered spittle dripping from its jowls, and if its attention wasn’t focused on her with rage-bleary eyes, Brienne could see herself sympathizing with the woeful creature howling at her. The skin underneath the bear’s fur was limp and ragged from malnourishment, and she spotted the angry red crisscross welts of whip marks on the poor beast’s shoulders.

But it _was_ dripping with its enraged foam _,_ and the roar from the mob was aggressively egging the poor animal into a wild frenzy. The bear lumbered towards her, and Brienne had enough time to swing the sword as she sidestepped away from the bear, growling at herself for being distracted by the animal’s mistreatment.

Her pity would not save the beast and it would not save her.

_Fucking Warrior, Father, and Crone, get your head on straight, girl!_

Brienne could hear the Tarth weapons-master cursing at her from her memories, and she breathed deep, trying to center herself, to focus, to pay attention to _anything_ other than the beast three times her size charging her once more.

She fell to the ground as she tried to step back, her foot caught in the train of the horrific dress Bolton had insisted she wear. She groaned as her shoulder and hip made impact with the shit-coated ground.

The sting of her fall distracted Brienne for no more than a second.

The bear was not so easily distracted.

It lumbered above her, lifted a front paw, slamming the paw down in an attempt to pin her neck.

Brienne rolled away, keening with pain as the bear’s claws dug into her flesh.

_Focus, get your head on straight!_

Brienne stumbled back to her feet, leveraging her weight up with the sword, clinging to the rough wood as she blinked a mist of pain away.

_Focus, dammit Brienne, FOCUS. I have to live, I have to live, shove the fear away, shove it away, shove it AWAY!_

The bear roared, preparing to charge once more.

Brienne lifted her sword.

_You cannot be afraid, don’t be afraid, don’t-!_


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In the future, nothing is the way it was.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think I've watched the bear pit scene about 40 times in the past 24 hours, so a big thanks once again to catherineflowers for this prompt. WHAT A GOOD SCENE.

Over the course of the past thirteen years, the Baelor Memorial Museum's morning staff had become quite accustomed to the near-constant presence of the tall, blonde woman sitting quietly by the entrance doors when the academic calendar reset each autumn. They moved through the quiet dance of opening the museum, shushing the questions of any seasonal trainees who stared and asked questions about the woman who would arrive bearing a slicker if it were raining, a parka if it was snowing, and a backpack with a bottle of sunscreen poking out of it when the first rays of spring warmed the city. The older guides knew the look of the obsessive students who would become obsessive historians, and _this_ one at least smiled when they saw her.

She would show her student’s identification to waive the entrance fee (her unassuming attitude and clockwork punctuality ensured she was the first person through the door) and the docents nodded politely every time she made her way down the Monarch Portrait Gallery toward the Hall of Heroes.

Brienne Tarth stood alone as she studied the entry on the page in the Book of Comrades from behind its plexiglass case. This early in the museum’s daily operations, the only noise in the hall was the whirring of the machine that gently turned each page of the ancient tome every half minute. When she had moved to New Citadel, she had convinced the registrar (with the help of her grandmother's shortbread recipe) to arrange her classes at Godswood University to fit a rather specific schedule. It ensured she would be here to see this page as often as she could.

Brienne waited patiently for the specific page that prompted her recurring vigil. The page in front of her turned, and her eyes flicked for a moment up to the red and gold lion emblazoned next to Ser Jaime Lannister before they searched for her specific target.

_There she is._

“ _…lost his hand preventing the assault of innocents at the hands of the Bolton Bannermen._

_Negotiated for the safe release of ~~Brienne~~ the Maid of Tarth after confrontation with a bear._

_Returned safe to King’s Landing by the Maid of Tarth to ensure the safety of Sansa Stark and of Arya Stark.”_

Brienne reached out, her fingers itching to touch the glass like they always did when she saw the name scratched out so hastily it had almost punctured the page. She chided herself before resigning to her compromise of old; her fingertips grazed the plaque informing the reader they were reading from the Book of Comrades, which had been known as the Book of Brothers before the Maid of Tarth became the Knight of Tarth at the hand of Ser Jaime Lannister.

_Negotiated for the safe release of ~~Brienne~~ the Maid of Tarth after confrontation with a bear._

Brienne had been ten when her father had first brought her to the mainland and this city that had once been known as King’s Landing. Her father had led her straight to the Baelor Memorial Museum from the Tarth ferry, and she had still been small enough to need to sit on her father’s shoulders to see her namesake’s first mention in mainland history. Brienne had looked down past her father’s ball-cap at the page, soaking in Ser Jaime Lannister’s careful script writing _her_ name.

_Our name._

Her father had chattered on about the myths of the two knights, their individual quests, and their eventual fight against the dead. Berwyn recited the story of how Ser Jaime’s actions would lead to Brienne of Tarth becoming _Ser_ Brienne of Tarth before leaving the North to protect his remaining family, but Brienne had locked onto that single sentence, memorizing it before demanding more information about the bear Ser Brienne and Ser Jaime had escaped from. Berwyn had chuckled and led Brienne down the halls to view various portraits and etchings until only the security guard politely informing them the museum was closing in fifteen minutes and a promised bribe of cheesecake had persuaded Brienne away from the exhibits.

Thus, an obsession was borne.

Her father’s family had descended from a minor line that had been awarded stewardship of Tarth, and Berwyn proudly declared how lucky he was to be the first of generations of Tarths to have fathered a daughter since the Lady Knight had sworn herself to the Kingsguard. She wasn’t the first Brienne on the isle, but she had been the first Brienne in their family. It turned her into a daydreamer, convinced that she was meant to know all there was to know about Ser Brienne. Berwyn humored her in her adolescence and had encouraged her to continue researching their ancestor in her early adulthood.

As the years passed, less of Tarth’s resident ‘gossiping grannies’, as her father had named them, reassured her she would grow into her looks so Brienne devoured stories of the Maid of Tarth’s “strong” face and committed to heart that s _he_ was never described as beautiful. When Brienne hit 6’4 before she was sixteen, she would escape to the Evenfall ruins, clamber over the rusted chain holding the gate in place, and stand at the topmost point of Tarth. She would breathe in the sea-salted air and allow herself to stand tall and unafraid, allowing her imagination to craft fantasies of fighting shoulder to shoulder with the other Brienne, both of them grinning with the rush of success. When Brienne pushed a sniggering boy away lest he steal her first kiss from her to simply impress his friends, she had run home to clamber into bed, refusing to shed tears over boys, and instead she had fallen asleep to dreams of a vaguely handsome man knighting her before battle.

Her father passed halfway through her undergrad years, and Brienne spent the subsequent three years delving into Berwyn’s countless belongings, a journey that had found herself laughing until she was weeping at the realization he had gone so far as to build a storage shed on Evenfall’s grounds, a place to store the family records he had spent half her lifetime collecting. The discovery had been a silent blessing on her decision to focus on the untold stories of the Age of the Four Wars, a choice Brienne had never been able to share with her father before his untimely heart attack. That very same storage shed had contributed to her very first peer-reviewed paper upon her return to school, and it now was the fodder for her thesis defense.

Brienne watched the pages turn, and smiled gently at Ser Brienne of Tarth’s first pages. The writing in the Book of Comrades was stilted, the formality leaping from the page, the strict and honorable devotion evident in every stroke of the pen she had written with. Brienne, however, knew better.

At the end of the various legalese in Berwyn Tarth’s will, he had left a note along with a combination to a small safe tucked into a corner of the storage shed, buried under diagrams of Tarth’s innovative steam-powered ships from three hundred years previous. The note had simply said, “These were meant for you”. It had taken Brienne the better part of a year to open the safe, and she had been thunderstruck at the contents.

Ser Brienne of Tarth had kept journals in her later years and every single volume was contained in a sealed chest with markings from the Age of the Four Wars.

Journals filled with every thought and feeling Ser Brienne had restrained from leaving on the pages of the Book of Comrades.

Ser Brienne had written the journals upon her return to Tarth, the year King Brandon Stark had disbanded the monarchy. Decade’s worth of agony and heartbreak and love and forgiveness had been poured into the pages that had been preserved for Brienne to look upon.

Brienne had read feverishly upon her realization of what the journals contained (she had not obsessively stared at Ser Brienne’s handwriting for nothing; she had recognized the script immediately), a detailed account of every facet of her life on the mainland in Westeros and after, from her devotion to the Failed Usurper Renly, to her discovery of the truth behind the death of Mad King Aerys, to her knighting, and most importantly for Brienne's eventual thesis, to the month that put Ser Brienne’s modern nickname of the Virgin Knight quite to shame.

A note had been attached to the chest containing the volumes, the script shaky as Ser Brienne’s hand had grown old and tired. Brienne had stared at it until the light on her phone had died, leaving her and the journals in the inky black of Tarth at midnight.

_The whole of these journals are for the next female Evenstar, and she alone will be tasked with maintaining their legacy. I write these as a guide for your journey as a leader for I, more than most, am fully conscious of the difference between the story one lives and the one that is told in the scrolls of history._

_My entry in the Book of Comrades is an honest tale of my life, but these volumes are the honest tale of my heart. Remember to honor both in your works to preserve our island and your happiness._

_May the Mother protect you, may the Maiden bring you laughter, and may the Crone light your way to wisdom._

_By my hand,_

_Ser Brienne of Tarth, Evenstar of Evenhall and Knight of the Six Kingdoms_

Brienne had gone home in a daze, and had returned the next day to pour obsessively over the volumes. For the next two years, she spent her daylight hours cataloguing the endless records of Tarth’s history that her father had collected, and she spent her waking nights committing to heart and memory every word on the fragile pages dedicated to her.

Following those two years, she had dove back into her education with a voracious appetite for any and all tales of both Ser Brienne and the women who had followed her legacy of honorable combat. She had developed a reputation as she approached her undergraduate’s final year of being willing to square off with anyone determined to question the value of women in Westeros’s history.

That same reputation followed her through her graduate program, and she had been bowled over by her rapid acceptance to Godswood University's doctoral program. Her thesis was to be the reveal of these journals. She had agonized over revealing the contents to the world, but Ser Brienne had entrusted her journals to Brienne the historian. If the Seven did truly exist, surely they had guided a historian to the journals for a reason.

Brienne sighed as the book pages turned away from Ser Brienne of Tarth’s final page, glancing fondly for a moment at _Ser Podrick Payne_ ’s entry before wandering aimlessly through the portrait gallery once more.

Tomorrow, she would defend her thesis to a committee made up of her soon-to-be contemporaries in the world of historic academia. She had requested an outside expert to attend her defense as well, determined as ever to ensure she was ready to spar with any stranger or naysayer of her research. Her thesis advisor, Dr, Arlyne Stark, had grinned with no little confusion at Brienne’s unusual request, but had nodded confidently.

“I know the perfect person.” Per Brienne’s request, she had withheld the mystery committee member’s identity to prevent Brienne from falling into any unnessesary and unhelpful research spirals the weeks before her thesis defense.

So here Brienne was, wandering the Baelor Memorial Museum’s still empty halls, trying her absolute best not to think about how her research was about to throw just about everything the historical community had come to understand about the first female knight of Westeros out the window.

By the time evening fell, she had all but given up on her half-hearted attempt to keep from fretting about the next day. She had no real reason to worry; the backbreaking work had all been done leading up to the actual defense of her thesis. 

Brienne had scoured all of Westeros to find handwriting experts and forgery consultants, determined to have Ser Brienne’s journals verified beyond a shadow of a doubt. She had renewed her passport just to travel to the North and request access to the Royal Conservatory’s Hall of Records where she read through the recordkeeping books of Queen Sansa Stark, noting every possible fact and scrawled note in the margins, crafting a full narrative on the specifics of Winterfell to flesh out Ser Brienne’s memories.

She really _was_ ready.

Brienne’s level of focus had always been described as passionate by her more friendly colleagues (obsessive by the men who felt threatened by her presence in the academia of war), and she was close to being irritated at how right they seemed as she stared up at the ceiling in the pitch-black of night. She sighed, checking the time on her phone, resisting the urge to toss it to the ground when the screen blinked out the early hours of the morning.

_Come on, woman. Your ancestor once fought bears and zombies, for Seven’s sake. You can manage to get to sleep before throwing the rest of your career and reputation at the mercy of your thesis committee._

She groaned, her mental pep talk doing nothing to assuage the near constant barrage of fears she felt her mind tossing at itself.

 _No pressure, right?_ _It’s not as if I’m about to completely up-end the entire academic world when I reveal the supposed virgin knight’s years-long love affair with the formerly reviled Ser Jaime Lannister, infamous breaker of Kings and how it plays into an entirely false narrative of women in battle throughout history. It’s fine. It’s fine! It’s fucking_ fine _, Brienne._

She pressed her palms into her eyes, her face compressing in irritation at her inability to distract herself from the continuous paranoid stream of thought keeping her awake. She closed her eyes, and tried to push away her anxiety.

_Dr. Stark believes in my work, and if anyone can find someone to question my work without making me want to kill them, I believe she can do it. Be like Ser Brienne, woman. Don’t be afraid._

She took a deep breath, repeating the mantra in her mind as her hands slipped away to her side.

_Don’t be afraid, don’t be afraid, don’t-_

* * *

_What is_ happening?! _Move, dammit!_

The first thing Brienne noticed was the pain.

Her eyes snapped open, and she choked on a scream at the _bear_ rearing in front of her.

 _Move, for the love of the_ Seven _, move!_

Brienne stumbled back, and the rest of her senses were flooded.

She could smell blood and bear scat; she tasted both of them almost immediately after the smell clogged her nostrils.

She clearly _saw_ the bear as it howled and scratched in a frenzy at the wooden planks boxing them both in. She heard the roaring and growling from the bear, but it was almost imperceptible over the carousing from the men standing all around them on the platforms, raucously singing and jeering down into the pit.

Brienne didn’t take her eyes away from the bear, so she felt, rather than saw the sword in her hand, could feel a splinter digging into her palm from the uneven grain of the wood. She felt the dress tugging on flexed muscles in some areas, and annoyingly loose in others. Her neckline had never felt so exposed.

Her throat and neck were throbbing from the gashes that had just barely missed an artery, for she could also feel blood merely trickling into her neckline rather than flowing steadily.

All this, however, was _nothing_ compared to the voice shrieking in her head for her to move.

 _Whatever you are, be you a god or demon, I do_ not _intend to die, so move my legs and get out of the way!_

Brienne had no choice but to obey the voice, and she let out a strangled cry of fear as she side-stepped the bear once more.

This surely had to be a nightmare, made all the more visceral by her earlier anxieties.

Surely.

The voice in her head continued to berate her, forcing her to move her limp arms into some form of a guard stance. She was focused in on the beast in front of her, letting out strangled growls of her own as she thrust the sword towards the bear.

The muscles in her arms were no match for the creature in front of her; she and the voice both let out a wordless groan when the bear reared up, swinging a paw at her shoulder.

Brienne let out a cry of pain, pushing desperately at the matted fur, crumpling to her knees.

 _Fight, damn you, fight! I will_ not _die, I do not wish to die here, please!_

The bear made contact again, and she wrestled as best as she could against the bear’s arms to prevent it from crushing her.

She pushed away, shouting with pain as she landed on the ground, and before she could stagger to her feet, a thump behind her signaled she was no longer alone.

_Jaime!_

Brienne froze, drinking in the sight of the Kingslayer-

 _His name is_ Jaime _._

She had no time to argue for Ser Jaime Lannister was grabbing her uninjured arm and hollering at her.

“Get behind me!”

_He’s hurt, I cannot, I will_ not-

But Jaime had enough strength in his remaining arm to drag Brienne behind him, and she ignored the arguing voice in her mind to focus on the bear. It had adjusted to the new body in the pit all too quickly and scratched at the ground in preparation to charge.

As it rumbled towards them, an arrow lodged in the beast’s shoulder and Brienne gasped for breath as two men argued and shouted above her.

“Pull her up!”

Jaime was yelling again, dashing to the edge of the wall and crouching to boost Brienne. She was not about to test the limits of this nightmare (which was feeling less and less like a simple dream) as she continued to feel blood drying on her skin, so she clambered onto Jaime’s shoulders and took the hands of the men reaching out to her.

_Help him! Pull him up, please save him!_

The voice in Brienne’s head was frantic as Brienne collapsed onto the wooden slats, and Brienne turned to the nearest man who had helped her.

“Hold my legs,” she ordered before flinging her body over the edge of the pit, stretching out. Jaime had managed to climb halfway up the wall and was clinging to a beam jutting out only barely out of her reach.

She grimaced as the wound in her shoulder screamed in protest, but she stretched her arms further, and soon she had Jaime Lannister’s hand and the remains of his arm in her hands and was pulling with all her strength to return him to safety.

The chaos from the crowd had settled, and Brienne struggled to regain her sense of balance as Jaime stood toe to toe with a weasel-like man sneering at the pair of them. She caught the hint of soft threats from Jaime, but she could ignore the voice in her head no longer.

 _‘Who are you?’_ she thought at the woman’s voice in her head.

The voice seemed just as shaken as she was.

_I am Brienne of Tarth, daughter of Lord Selwyn Tarth. What sort of god invades a stranger’s mind, why do you not know me?_

Brienne’s own thoughts were racing, and she felt a pit settling in her stomach. Her shoulder still screamed in pain and she could still taste blood on her tongue. This could not possibly be a dream.

_'I’m not a god. I’m Brienne Tarth.'_

The other Brienne, the Ser Brienne of her daydreams, was awash with wordless confusion, and Brienne did her best to picture her reality in her mind, showing the other Brienne her world in small flashes of memory.

“Well. We best be on our way.” Jaime’s voice had picked up as the two Briennes’ thoughts spiraled into a near panic, and she snapped her head up to focus back in on the reality of her own research playing out before her.

“Sorry about the sapphires.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next up, I earn the rating on this fic 😉


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Open communication solves all sorts of problems

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The following is very much NSFW. Despite a lot of clothes staying on. The joy of frottage, what can I say?

There were two things that had to be settled before the party set for King’s Landing could depart. Brienne’s wounds needed tending to, and she needed to wake up from this dream turned nightmare. Her biggest issue with the latter was a complete lack of her mind wanting to wake her up. In fact, it seemed determined to argue with her.

_You think I wanted to have my own mind shoved to the side like an unwelcome guest?_

_‘I am not going to engage with a figment of my imagination, I’m_ imagining _you, there is no possible way I’m in the mind of my hero, and would you please_ stop _shouting at me?’_

The other Brienne’s sullen silence was almost as distracting as Brienne followed Jaime blindly into a small anteroom by the stables at the main gate. He pulled a chair out for her, and she collapsed into it with a small, sharp gasp of pain.

“Tend to her wounds, Qyburn. It will be with my thanks if you could keep her from dying before we make it to King’s Landing.”

The man Jaime had addressed moved forward, bowing quickly, before holding up bandages. “If I may, my lady?”

Brienne straightened in the chair slightly, nodding at Qyburn. “Please.”

As Qyburn attended to her shoulder, she glanced over at the man who had jumped into a bear pit to save her. Her thoughts drifted to the many passages of Ser Brienne’s journals she had memorized over the past five years.

_Jaime had rescued me, and this time it had come with both of us knowing the full measure and cost of the last time he had come to my aid. He stood watching the former maester Qyburn patch me back up without uttering a single word, and it was only in my dreams to follow that he told me why he had jumped into a hole in the ground with naught but his still recovering wound to help protect me._

_I never did ask him why he came back, although our time in Winterfell gave me ample opportunities. I never thought I would be brave enough to hear him say that, like me, that was the first time he realized there was love behind his thoughts and actions. I could handle losing him if what existed between us was only desire. I do not think I could think on him leaving me if there had been love there as well._

The man of those words was indeed watching Qyburn intensely, and Brienne allowed herself the chance to truly take in all that Ser Jaime Lannister was in reality. The stories told of a golden lion who matched his sister in looks and ferocity, but this man had been hewn from those myths and tales, and was merely a man standing in front of her. His face still showed signs of their entire journey across the Riverlands, and his beard only contained glints of gold. His hair was long, but much more human than lion-like in the way it framed his face. Brienne held back a hysterical laugh as she took in the sharp angles of his face, a jaw that absurdly had her blood singing and a nose that looked nothing like any drawings of Ser Jaime.

She could sense discomfort from the Brienne in her mind, and she felt her stomach drop. She had never had a dream as vivid as this one… what if it truly was reality? How was she to return to her own body? If she was here forever, what would happen to the Brienne she was meant to be?

 _I do not wish to spend the rest of_ my _life as a mere spectator to my own life either._

Brienne hissed through her teeth as Qyburn applied a white powder to her shoulder and plastered linen bandages to her skin. She bit her lip before speaking her first words as the Lady Brienne.

“Would it be possible to find me something other than this to wear?” She directed the question to the former maester, trying to hide any disgust for the man. She recognized the name, and tried to remember there was no cause to outright hate him yet.

“If you feel I can do no more for your shoulder, I would be happy to, my lady.” Brienne nodded silently, and Qyburn gathered his assorted medical supplies before bowing himself out into the hallway.

Brienne fretted with a scrap of the dress before inhaling deeply. She tried not to burst into hysterical tears at the sheer absurdity of her situation, but a small whimper of distress managed to slip from her lips.

“Are you certain you don’t require more care? That wound does not look like nothing, Brienne.” Jaime’s voice was soft, unbearably so.

“Stop. Please, just… stop. I need to tell you something, and it’s harder when you... it’s harder when you sound like that.” She winced at the harsh timbre of her voice. It was hers, though. Unmistakably her voice.

Jaime frowned, and Brienne barreled forward.

“I’m not- shit.” Jaime’s eyebrows shot up at the curse, but he remained blessedly quiet. “I’m not Brienne. I mean, I am Brienne, but I am not _your_ Brienne.”

The sullen voice was back, tinged with a small hint of fear. _I am not_ his _Brienne._

“What in the seven hells are you talking about, Brienne? Did the bear manage to rattle your skull in addition to slashing you open?” Jaime replied, stopping his pacing. Brienne glared right back.

“Don’t think I don’t realize how ridiculous I sound right now. My mind has _two_ of us in here. The Brienne you saved and- well, and me.” Brienne cringed slightly. “I’m… I’m from the future.” Gods, it sounded so trite for how monumental a thing it was.

 _He won’t believe you. I hardly believe you, and I am inside your mind._ The other Brienne was angry. Brienne couldn’t blame her.

“You do sound ridiculous.” Jaime snapped, a hint of fear in his eyes at what could only seem like madness to him.

“Do you really think she would make something like this up?” She snapped right back, wincing at the throbbing pain along her collarbone, agitated by the fur on the dress’s collar. Brienne never hated this the reality of this story more than this moment where the dress’s matted fur lining and poorly dyed pink linen scratched at her skin. She growled as she tugged at the laces on the bodice, trying to drag the fabric of the neckline away from the bandaged gashes at her throat.

She looked up at a strangled noise from Jaime, and looked down to notice the loosened ties to her dress had also revealed the small curve of her breasts. Brienne’s eyes flicked back up to his, and she could hear the other Brienne panicking in the back of her head.

Brienne bit her lip before gingerly re-tightening the laces, and both her and Jaime resolutely ignored the tightened fabric did nothing to hide her nipples suddenly straining against the linen.

_Oh for the love of the Seven, what must he think of me?_

Brienne’s brain was well and truly broken by her realization she had awakened in the very era of her expertise and that she was sitting in front of the literal man who had inspired her half formed fantasies as a girl, and had led to many a satisfied night in her modern age with her modern toys. She was also having to deal with the other Brienne being exposed to those same flashes of half formed memories, and well-

 _Toys? Wha- Oh._ Brienne blushed as her own thoughts and the other Brienne’s thoughts brushed against one another, and how it made the other Brienne strangely quiet as she experienced Brienne’s embrace of her own pleasure.

“Lady Brienne, please. Do you hear yourself? You’re Brienne but you aren’t _my_ Brienne?” Jaime’s protest was much weaker now. Brienne looked at the man in front of her, warring with his disbelief and she laughed humorlessly.

_He trusts me._

“You say you trust Brienne, why can’t you trust me now? Is it because of your sister? You’re going to have to go back to King’s Landing to see what your sister has become before you can trust anyone, I remember now.”

_Don’t… please. I have no wish to hear about… about her._

Jaime’s eyes sharpened, and Brienne’s heart broke at the wistfulness hiding behind the flint-like daggers he was shooting her, and the fear in the other Brienne’s thoughts.

“What do you know about Cersei? What did they tell you?”

Brienne straightened, ignoring the bite of pain in her shoulder. If all of this _was_ a horrible nightmare, she might as well ensure Jaime knew all too well what his sister was capable of. And what it did ( _‘Or is it what it will do?’_ Brienne thought, her mind swimming in her current place in the past) to the whole of Westeros. “All of your children will die thanks to her actions and you will still return to her side every time. You are going to bed Brienne for all of a _month_ before leaving her alone to die with your sister. You will _break_ her. I wouldn’t even _BE_ here if her father hadn’t slept with half the women of Tarth and named one of them an heir after she joined the Kingsguard for a king no one remembers and no one cares about. That’s the legacy you leave her, and she _forgives_ you.”

Jaime’s pallor grew ashy with every word from Brienne’s mouth, except for a flush when Brienne mentioned bedding. The voice in Brienne’s head, the _other_ Brienne, was quiet again. Brienne barreled on, gasping as the words make her chest ache.

“She is going to write about you saving all of King’s Landing and of knighting her and fighting against the Dead Army, and she is going to _forgive you_. Why does she do that? If I’m going to spend the rest of this nightmare as this Brienne, can you tell me why you make her feel like she’s soaring and drowning all at the same time?”

Brienne shuddered slightly as the pain in her shoulder still refused to disappear. This dream had gone on far too long, and her dreams never hurt like this.

 _This is no dream_ , the other Brienne’s voice was quiet as it slid back into their mind, _you know this is no dream._

“And what if this is no nightmare? What if by some bizarre turn of fate, I’ve been sucked into the mind of a woman as far removed from my time as you are to the arrival of the first Men to this continent? What if I have altered all of history just by _yelling_ at you? What if I’ve removed the first lady knight from existence? What if-“

Jaime had interrupted Brienne’s growing panic and the other Brienne’s thoughts with an impulsive kiss, his remaining hand grasping the uninjured side of her neck.

 _Oh._ Oh.

 _‘’Oh’ is right’,_ Brienne thought to her other self, shuddering as Jaime pulled away as quickly as he had pulled her in.

“I’m… I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have done that.” He looked startled, and Brienne felt more than heard her other self’s distress.

_Whatever he means to do… he came back. He saved me, saved us. That is not nothing._

“You killed Aerys. And you came back. You didn’t have to come back, but you came back.” Brienne’s voice broke as she voiced the other Brienne’s thoughts, and felt for a moment the goodness that would lead to Brienne’s eventual forgiveness.

Jaime swallowed again, and look struck as he let his eyes drink in Brienne, speaking for herself and for the Brienne in her head.

 _Why-_ “Why did you come back?” Brienne could feel the other Brienne’s question, for it was her question too, and it was both Briennes that waited for Jaime’s answer. His breathing was heavy as he looked into their eyes, his expression hooded with _something_.

“I cannot… I will not live in a world where my life means your death.”

 _Is that-_ “Is that all?” Brienne’s own breathing was heavy. She felt a fluttering in her chest and a tightening in her stomach that belonged to her, but it also belonged to Ser Brienne.

“No. No, I don’t believe it was, Brienne. ”

Brienne bit back a harsh laugh of disbelief, and reached for Jaime, propelled by the thoughts and desires of the other Brienne in her head, craving all that this Brienne had denied herself with Renly, all that both her and the original Brienne had denied themselves since the first time they realized how reviled a strong and tall and stubborn woman could be in this world.

When her hand stroked his cheek under the rough beard that had grown during his captivity, Jaime let out a sharp hiss.

“If what you say is true, how can I touch you and not hurt you, how can I know I’m not hurting either one of you?” Jaime’s eyes were burning as they drank her in. The other Brienne’s memories flashed back to the way he had looked at her in the bath.

This was different.

_I’ll say no. Tell him, TELL HIM I’ll say no._ The other Brienne was practically hollering in her head, and Brienne winced.

“Brienne is shouting at me right now that she’ll let me know if she doesn’t like anything, and I’m not exactly good at hiding that, am I?” Jaime’s eyes continued to blaze as Brienne shakily grinned, and he reached up to pin her hand to his cheek.

“I suppose I’ll have to try and keep my eyes open, then.”

Brienne’s mouth went dry.

_Yes._

It was the difference of a single moment. In one, Jaime’s hand rested gently on hers, and the only passion either Brienne felt was the interest and desire in his eyes.

The next, Brienne’s small noise of surprised was muffled as Jaime leaned down towards her and sought out her mouth. This kiss was no impulsive act of a man desperate and confused.

_This is the man I fought on the bridge._

At that thought from the other Brienne, her whole body trembled, and Brienne could feel a warmth building from the top of her spine that spread down to pool between her legs. The other Brienne’s thoughts were wordless, just moments of shock and of desire that sent Brienne’s own thoughts racing and flooded her veins with want.

_I want him._

And Jaime’s eyes were still open.

She reached up to grasp Jaime’s hair with her left hand running her nails along his scalp, sighing as he let out a groan.

 _Gods, make him do that again,_ the other Brienne begged.

Jaime was trying desperately to push himself closer to her, and he growled against her mouth when she opened her mouth to deepen their kiss.

_Yes, just like that._

Nipping at her bottom lip, Jaime pulled away to rest his forehead against hers, his breath escaping in ragged huffs. Brienne whined, feinting towards his mouth to try and steal another kiss from him.

“I want you, Brienne.” The words sounded deliciously lewd in his rough whisper. He gazed down at her, the heat from his eyes making Brienne feel more naked than she’d ever felt in her life.

“Don’t move.” He gritted out, his mouth hot on her neck. “Wrap your arms around me.” Jaime kept his focus on Brienne as she did as he instructed before wrapping his own arms around her waist. She could feel the bluntness of his stump against the small of her back.

“Now your legs.” His head dropped into the hollow of her undamaged shoulder and she felt the words sinking into her skin as she did as she was told.

 _This is important to_ him, the other Brienne thought faintly, impressed and moved by Jaime’s determination. Brienne kept her body still as he lifted her from the chair, gasping when his teeth raked against her skin. It was a different pain from the throbbing on the other side of her neck, different enough to have her whimpering with the effort of not moving.

 _Please… please! “Please_ , Jaime.” Brienne repeated the thoughts of the other Brienne, begging for both of them, the desires of both Briennes hungered for more contact and less negotiation of bodies. Brienne let one of her legs slide from Jaime’s waist to the ground, giving her enough leverage to pull him into her. Her dress had been hiked up enough she could feel the coarse linen of his breeches rubbing against her inner thigh. She kept pulling greedily at him, backing them up against the wall.

 _Thank the gods I’m not still in armor,_ the other Brienne thought, making Brienne laugh breathlessly.

“Are you well, Lady Brienne?” Jaime’s voice was low as he raked his hand across Brienne’s collar to tug the half-tied laces of Brienne’s bodice open, dipping his head down to suck at the skin he was exposing.

Brienne half gasped, half laughed.

“She –ah! She’s glad we’re not wearing armor.” Jaime breathed a laugh against her skin, tugging the fabric apart to flick at her exposed nipple with his tongue, barely grazing it with his teeth.

Jaime licked a trail back up her neck to mouth at the undamaged expanse of skin. It was distracting enough that Brienne didn’t even notice how Jaime had managed to press the full plane of his body against hers, but that changed the moment he ground his hips into hers. At the feel of his thigh and his cock against Brienne’s leg and cunt, she cried out in a strangled, surprised haze of newfound pleasure.

 _Do that again, please!_ Brienne’s eyes were wide as she felt the whole of Jaime’s cock pressing against her thigh. The scrap of smallclothes the other Brienne had been forced to wear was next to useless compared to the sensations just having their legs slotted together was giving her.

“Do you want me, Brienne?” Jaime rolled his hips again, biting his way up to her ear. His cock was hot and hard against her thigh, and she whined before her hips twitched against his.

“Yes- yes, please,” she sighed, arching her back.

_Yes, yes, yes, yes._

“Both of you want me?”

With a chorus of needy pleas for him to not stop, to keep moving, to rub right there, cascading through Brienne’s mind as the other Brienne allowed herself to want every bit of this pleasure, Brienne could do nothing but moan with the pleasure of both herself and the other Brienne that was coursing through her skin.

Jaime growled, pulling his hips away from her and Brienne yelped in protest.

“ _Both_ of you want me, Brienne?” He demanded, his voice rumbling in his chest.

_YES._

_“_ Yes, Jaime. Please- yes,” Her voice broke on the last, pleading ‘yes’, and she almost sobbed with relief when all of Jaime pressed against her once more.

With Jaime heavy against her, Brienne lost herself once more to the sheer sensation of his lithe and still slightly battered frame refusing to back down from this all too different type of fight. Jaime’s single functioning hand slid from her waist to grasp the breast that had been fully exposed by his teeth. His other arm still held her safe, the strength keeping them both supported against the wall.

 _He lost that hand for me,_ the other Brienne thought faintly, in between the thoughts that better resembled gasps and whining rather than actual words. Brienne tightened her leg around Jaime’s waist, uttering one of her own gasps when Jaime’s moan at the feel of her inner thigh pressing into his cock reached her ears.

“You want me, Jaime?” The words tumbled out of her mouth as she dragged her hips back and forth, wanton against his leg. She could feel her clit slick and swollen through the layers of fabric, and she felt the other Brienne’s surprise and interest and _want_ when Brienne allowed her imagination to conjure an image what Jaime’s beard would feel like as he devoted those lips of his to worshipping her cunt.

Jaime nodded against her neck, uttering a groan as he nipped at the skin closest to his mouth. Brienne grabbed his hair with the hand that wasn’t pinned by his arm, tugging gently.

“Yes, _yes_ , Brienne,” Jaime growled, his own breathing ragged in her ear.

_Right there, again!_

Brienne could sense the other Brienne’s own greed for the sensation teasing both of them; they both knew this body so well, and it made her shudder against Jaime.

Jaime muttered half-formed pleas for release, his hips recklessly bucking into her leg as Brienne shamelessly rode his. Three voices begged for that sweet sensation they could all just begin to taste, it was really just a matter of who would give in first.

“Yes- Jaime, yes, we want you- gods, that’s it, that’s it tha-!” Brienne’s mouth opened into a soundless shout as her vision went white. As she came, Brienne could hear her other self shrieking with the same pleasure she felt, and a bizarrely calm corner of her brain reflected that Jaime would have to learn the other Brienne was a screamer.

The white in her vision faded to tiny sparking stars, and both Jaime and Brienne went limp, their bodies heavy against the stone wall. He laughed against her jaw as he lazily kissed his way to her temple.

“I haven’t done that since I was a boy with-” He broke off, confused, and looked up at Brienne. She could see a shadow of the boy he had been, and she grasped his hand.

 _He told Lady Catelyn so easily…_ the other Brienne was just as confused, and for the second time, Brienne could sense this distinct fear of a woman not yet known to the other Brienne.

“With Cersei.” She finished his sentence, ignoring for a brief moment the twinge of pain that shot through to her stomach. That pain could not be blamed on the bear.

“Yes.”

Brienne stroked hair away from Jaime’s temple, her own expression pensive. “I don’t know how to begin talking to you about her. In my time, you died with her, and you left Brienne alone.” Brienne took a deep breath, willing the oxygen into her limbs so she could grasp Jaime’s face.

His hand came up to caress hers, almost by instinct. The other Brienne was quiet, but Brienne could sense her evaluating this moment much like a general observing the field of war.

“What I do know is… you will need to talk about it. And if you truly wish to break away from her, this moment is as good as any to start.” Jaime’s hand shook as he gazed up at her. Brienne felt her cheeks warming as his eyes shined with warmth towards her, and she cleared her throat.

“Qyburn will surely be back soon.” She reminded him, and he blinked to shake himself from his reverent gaze.

 _I do not want him to return to her._ The other Brienne admitted softly to her descendant.

_‘I don’t either.’_

* * *

The whole of the party destined for King’s Landing departed soon after, Brienne finally dressed in much more practical clothing as they slowly made their way out of Harrenhal and back towards the King’s Road. Jaime spent most of his time conversing with the rest of their party. Brienne noticed his easy grins and comforting backslaps, earning reluctant grins from the men escorting them to the capitol.

 _He’s formidable, even without a hand._ Brienne couldn’t help it; her mind spun recklessly towards what Jaime had done just hours ago lacking a hand, and she felt the other Brienne splutter, _I will be ruined forever if I think this way once you’ve returned to your time._

_‘Do you- what if I can’t go back?’_

The other Brienne was quiet for a long time after that thought.

As Brienne settled down in their makeshift camp, Jaime rolled out his bedroll next to her. He watched with soft eyes as he took in her own organized area with the corners of her coverlet tucked tightly around her own bedroll.

“You both tuck the corners exactly the same.” He murmured over the sound of the fire and the other men making camp. She shot him a grin as he shook out his blanket, and turned away with a flush as she clambered under the coverlet.

_I think –that is, if you cannot return, I think we will find a way. He sees us both; that is not nothing._

Brienne took deep breaths of the crisp, damp night air, shivering slightly as she took in stars looking down on her, stars she had never seen in her lifetime. A moment later, Jaime’s hand found hers.

_‘We will find a way.’_

“Goodnight, Ser Jaime.” She whispered.

“Goodnight, Lady Brienne.” He replied, and Brienne closed her eyes to the Westeros of the past.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In the future, some things are the way they were.

_Three years later_

_Six hundred years into the future_

The Baelor Memorial Museum opened every day at nine in the morning, but for the past three years, they had made a special exception for the Women in War class taught at Godswood University. At the end of the fall quarter, the museum opened an hour earlier for one of its most consistent patrons and her students to roam the halls.

Dr. Brienne Tarth was militantly punctual and imbued her students with the same reverence for reliability, which had solidified the museum’s decision to open early this one day of the year. The past two years, not a single student had arrived late, and the Baelor Memorial staff noted a soft grin on Dr. Tarth’s face as she greeted her students. It seemed another year’s perfect attendance record was set, and the doors opened for the twelve academics in Brienne’s class at eight on the dot.

“Just in case any of you missed me mentioning it about a hundred times during the quarter, today is my favorite day on the syllabus.” Brienne’s group laughed, and she smiled. “This class is meant to be an introduction to the women of the Age of War, but more than anything else, I have always designed it to be about the untold stories, and how all it takes is one person to find those stories and change our entire understanding of the world.”

The class let out a general murmur. “I know, I know, field trips to the museum seem rather outdated when one considers you’re all studying for your doctorate, but I want to ask a question before we make our way down the Monarch Portrait Gallery. Why did you take this class? You don’t have to answer aloud, but I’m happy to hear anyone’s reasons if you feel comfortable sharing.”

Brienne’s students shuffled their feet, until one of her students’ hand shot up. “Yes, Allysane.”

“My mom ran for public office last year and I wanted to know more about when we used to be a monarchy. Plus, Mom’s always been the coolest person in the world to me next to Queen Arya, so I figured I’d learn more about her.” Allysane scratched at her neck awkwardly after her confession, but beamed when Brienne flashed her a thumbs up.

“Good answer! Anyone else? Bryndan, go ahead.”

“I wanted to be a knight like Ser Jaime when I was a kid.” Bryndan turned to speak towards Allysane. “When he stepped down as Hand to the New Dragon King and the position passed to Arya Stark before she inherited the Northern throne, I wanted to be Queen in the North.”

Dr. Tarth’s smile grew fond at the mention of Ser Jaime, and her students all chuckled as Bryndan pulled up a photo of him as Queen Arya Stark.

“I grew up on stories of Brienne of Tarth, so I know exactly how you feel.” Brienne looked down at her watch and grinned.

“Speaking of which, follow me.”

Brienne led them to the Book of Comrades, and shepherded her students around the display case.

“My father brought me here when I was a girl to see my namesake, and the poor man had to drag me away from the museum with a bribe before I was even close to being ready to leave. When we arrived, I got to see-”Brienne paused for a moment as the page turned, “my name and my ancestor’s name written for the first and only time in the Book of Comrades.”

Brienne smiled sat her grad students as she took a step back; she had been so nervous the first time she had allowed herself the flair of dramatics with the Book of Comrades, but every year it had resulted in her students crowding the plexi-glass and innocent, chastising whispers to stop pushing.

She spoke up as they whispered softly to one another about Brienne of Tarth and jockeyed for a better vantage point before the page turned again.

“Today is just about you rediscovering what you love about history. We have the museum for an hour, and I’d like you to go and explore. There’s no assignment or homework between terms; I just want you to enjoy our history for a while.”

Brienne stood and watched the 20 somethings looking at one another before Allysane let out an exasperated noise. “Well, the paintings of King Jon aren’t going to look at themselves.” She grabbed the hands of Bryndan and the woman next to her and dragged them back towards the main portrait hall. Before Brienne needed to worry, the rest of her class slowly petered out of the Hall of Heroes. She strode over to gaze down at the Book of Comrades, watching the page turn to detailing the first men named to King Jon Targaryen’s Kingsguard and their acts of valor.

It had been three years since she had woken up in a new reality. Brienne had woken slowly, and then all at once as she felt the lack of a second mind in her head.

Within a matter of moments, she had shoved her feet into the closest footwear (a pair of rain galoshes), thrown a coat over her flannel pajamas, and had hailed a taxi to the university. Once she was at her desk, she collapsed, her mind spinning. She had a moment of thanks sent to whatever gods were listening that her desk was in the same place, and that Ser Brienne’s journals still existed and she still had access to their scanned pages.

That was when she found a second letter tucked away in her file cabinet addressed to her. In Ser Brienne’s no-nonsense hand, the aged parchment had read: “To the other Brienne, for when you wake in an unknown future” and she had read it over and over again over the past three years as her mind adjusted to the new timeline she had suddenly found herself returned to.

_Brienne,_

_There are many times over the span of the last forty summers I have tried and failed at writing this letter to you. At first it was because, like you when you were here, I spent ages trying to convince myself you were a dream. If it had not been for Jaime’s presence at my side, I think I would have marked it as the ravings of a madwoman. The next morning, once you had gone and I was myself once more, he said he knew it was me._

_I am often struck at how well he knew me even then._

Brienne had stroked the page, her long fingers caressing the other Brienne’s mention of her Jaime.

_Though we married in secret, there was always a third witness to our lives through you, and I thank you for being an ever present voice in my head after you had left. Did it change who I was, knowing you were waiting for me? Did I speak up more and demand more, both for myself and those I loved, knowing you would defend me in the future? Did I become better knowing you protected me as I was before you invaded my head? I would like to think so._

_“Marriage?”_ Brienne had yelped aloud, dropping the letter for a moment, reaching for the journals and her laptop before shaking her head and stilling her hands. She had no idea where she would even begin to re-learn her own history.

_Best to finish the letter first._

She had picked the page back from her desk.

_Jaime also wishes to thank you for scaring him back into his senses. (His words, not mine.) He also would like to tell you he hopes you find your own happiness as we did once the wars were over, and Westeros had no more need of knights like us to wield our swords. Sometimes, when I hold his only hand or when I am able to wrap myself around him, I can feel the traces of where you lived in my mind for only a few hours, and I wish I could share these moments of bliss with you in addition to what you survived when you were here._

Brienne bit back a strangled sob. There was easily forty years’ worth of love on the page, and she found herself weeping as she read the last portion of the letter.

_I have not forgotten the journals you showed me when you were here, so please do not worry yourself for they will not suddenly disappear. These volumes detail every point in our journey we could remember. I thank you for ensuring it was a long and happy journey towards the end._

_May the Crone grant you wisdom, may the Mother protect you, may the Maiden grant you happiness, may the Smith craft you a will of iron, may the Father give you strength, may the Warrior bring you battles you are best suited to win, and may the Stranger visit you as a friend and not an enemy._

_Remember our house words, Brienne: Lightning before Thunder._

_Ser Brienne Lannister of Tarth, Evenstar of Evenfall Hall and Knight of the Six Kingdoms_

Brienne had spent the next few hours poring over her scans of the journals, obsessively noting every difference and jotting it down in indecipherable scribbles in her own journal of notes. She had fallen asleep with a pen in her hand and woke with a start as dawn was starting to creep in.

It was a stroke of luck that the Brienne of her more recent past had scheduled her thesis defense for the following week rather than later that morning, and Brienne had stumbled her way into a taxi back home to her apartment before falling asleep with the letter pressed to her cheek and a single rain boot still snugly on her foot.

After a few blessedly dreamless hours of sleep, Brienne had awoken, and she had found her mind weaving both the life she remembered and the life she had now actually lived together. Her memories over the next few days had been a confusing mixture of contradictions, but she had been gratified to see more similarities than differences.

It had been unseasonably hot when she had originally visited the North, now her memories were those of a freshly fallen snow. Her father had died in a hospital on the mainland, no… now he died in hospice care at home. It was easier than having to research her own life obsessively as she also researched the other Brienne again for the first time, but not by much.

The first opportunity she had, Brienne was back to see the Book of Comrades for the first time and the thousandth time both. She knew what the book would look like from the memories layered over one another, but she was determined to see them afresh in her new reality.

Brienne had stood gazing at the pages, willing them to turn, and she had let out a small hum of recognition when Jaime’s page appeared.

_Ser Jaime Lannister_

_Squired for Barristan Selmy against the Kingswood Outlaws. Knighted and named to the Kingsguard in his sixteenth year for valor in the field: At the Sack of King's Landing murdered his king, Aerys the second, at the foot of the Iron Throne._

_Pardoned by King Robert Baratheon._

_Thereafter known as the Kingslayer._

_After the murder of King Joffrey I by Tyrion Lannister served under King Tommen I._

_Captured in the field at the Whispering Wood._

_Set free by Lady Catelyn Stark in return for an oath to find and guard her two daughters. Lost his hand preventing the assault of innocents at the hands of the Bolton Bannermen._

_Negotiated for the safe release of Brienne of Tarth after confrontation with a bear._

_Returned safe to King’s Landing by Brienne of Tarth to ensure the safety of Sansa Stark, and of Arya Stark._

In the space between the two final lines of Jaime’s entry in the White Book, Brienne now knew there were oceans of words unspoken. She was all too aware her thesis would be blowing the doors open on Ser Brienne of Tarth _and_ Ser Jaime Lannister.

Because in this space between lines, Brienne and Jaime had married.

In this space, Jaime had given Brienne Oathkeeper and sent them both on quests to rescue the children that had been endangered by the actions of the very adults supposed to protect them.

In between these lines, he had been asked to choose between death and life, and he had chosen life.

_Dismissed from the Kingsguard by Queen Cersei Lannister, First of Her Name, for treason and crimes against the realm after failing to return from Dorne with the Princess Myrcella Baratheon._

“Did you do the dramatic page flip reveal again?” A voice from the far end of the hall shook Brienne from her memories, and she smiled at the speaker.

“Jaime! Of course I did.” Striding towards her was _her_ Jaime, a descendant of Gerion Lannister and determined to exhibit all the equally irritating and charming characteristics of Gerion’s nephew.

Jaime Lannister had been the expert Dr. Stark had brought to Brienne’s thesis defense as the premier archivist and director of Baelor Memorial Museum. After the second hour of Jaime’s critical and knowledgeable eye over her work, he had turned to Arlyne and declared Brienne the only student of hers in the past five years to be worthy of the Doctor title. Jaime had called Brienne the next day as a volunteer to do the official authentication on all of Ser Brienne’s journals. As he had pored over and passionately embraced the untold story of the Sapphire Knight and her husband, he had also reached out to embrace Brienne just as passionately.

Brienne smiled fondly at him, and he propelled himself up onto his tip-toes to steal a kiss.

“You’re very good at that.” Jaime’s grin was soft, wholly his own, and yet shining with the same intensity of the other Jaime.

_It’s time to tell him._

“There’s something I want to show you.” Jaime arched his brow. “ _Not_ that, I told you I’m not going to let you feel me up in the museum.”

Brienne hesitated for a moment, clutching the strap of her satchel across her body. “This… I held a letter back from publication from Ser Brienne to me.”

Jaime frowned. “You did publish that letter. It’s the one addressed to the next female Evenstar. I remember being in the room for the authentication, Brienne.”

Brienne swallowed. _Be brave. Lightning before thunder._ “Not- not that letter, Jaime. She wrote that as a fail-safe. This is the one she left for _me._ ”

She withdrew the letter from Ser Brienne from its home in her satchel, holding it out to him. Jaime’s eyes flicked to hers; he hadn’t missed her emphasis on the word ‘me’.

Jaime’s entire demeanor was relaxed as he looked at Brienne. There was still a slight furrow to his brow and a crinkling around his eyes, but they hadn’t already made it through two years of dating without solidifying a foundation of faith between them. It had been there when she had been ready to hear about his life growing up in foster care, and he had been ready to hear her talk about the day she had said goodbye to her father.

He took the letter, tucking it carefully under his arm, and took her hand.

“I trust you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you once again to Catherine Flowers for giving me such a delightful prompt to play with!  
> I didn't REALLY realize this was going to be a s8 fix-it of sorts until I was halfway through writing this chapter and realized I had created a scenario that would lead to quite a few little things changing, in addition to assuring the courtyard scene never happens. I didn't go into detail about them all because I like the idea of getting to return to the canon side of this and maybe telling more of those stories in full. Happy to answer any and all questions on how things play out in my mind in this alternate timeline!
> 
> Many thanks to [redacted] and our organizers for helping me keep my head on straight while writing this. Y'all are gems of the highest order.

**Author's Note:**

> Full disclosure, this fic will not be posted in full by the 14th, but I PROMISE it'll be posted in full before the authorship reveal.


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